January 7, 2014 (The Next Billion)
BENTON'S COMMUNICATIONS-RELATED HEADLINES for TUESDAY, JANUARY 7, 2014
INTERNET/TELECOM
In 2014 the next billion will access the mobile internet -- at $20 a handset - analysis
How Broadband Boosts Household Income
Principles for a Successful IP Transition: Accessibility
Unfair Phone Charges for Inmates - editorial
Slow Broadband Internet Speeds Vex Nation's Schools
Big City Community Networks: Lessons from Seattle and Gigabit Squared - analysis
Colorado Lawmakers aim to shift $50 million phone subsidy toward broadband
Championing affordable Internet access in St Paul - analysis [links to web]
AT&T's special access proposal faces fire from CompSouth [links to web]
SPECTRUM/WIRELESS
T-Mobile Swap Gives Verizon Spectrum, $2.4 Billion in Cash
Why T-Mobile wants Verizon’s discarded 4G airwaves - analysis
The nature of wireless competition - editorial
Biannual NTIA/FCC Spectrum Planning Meeting (Jan 2014) - press release
Verizon plows ahead on text-to-911, while AT&T 'resets' testing schedule
DIVERSITY
Apple Facing Criticism About Diversity Changes Bylaws
African Americans and Technology Use - research
CONTENT
AT&T Allows Advertisers to Sponsor Mobile Data
AT&T’s Sponsored Data plan isn’t the end of network neutrality but it is a new model for wireless - analysis
AT&T's Sponsored Data is bad for the internet, the economy, and you - analysis
Detecting time travelers on the Internet is remarkably difficult [links to web]
Apps for mobile viewing challenge cable operators, TV networks - analysis
Will Digital Networks Ruin Us? - analysis
OWNERSHIP
A new power in conservative media
Rep. Henry Waxman Suggests Tribune Is Looting LA Times Before Proposed Newspaper Spinoff
San Francisco to charge operators of tech commuter buses
TELEVISION
Online Video Could Get a Boost From Proposed Laws
Sen McCain: Near-Blackouts Argue for FANS Act [links to web]
Phillies sign new deal with Comcast SportsNet [links to web]
GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
How the NSA Threatens National Security - op-ed
FISA and Sen Paul Face Off Over Domestic Spying
President Obama plans intelligence surveillance reforms, aides say
NSA revelations: the 'middle ground' everyone should be talking about - op-ed
The NSA is collecting too much information - analysis [links to web]
PRIVACY/SECURITY
Snapchat’s bad security shows how data use policies fail - analysis
How your cell number pinpoints your identity - op-ed
Sen Franken calls for location privacy law after GAO study
Poll: Cyberwarfare Is Top Threat Facing US [links to web]
Data privacy: What school leaders should know - op-ed [links to web]
GOVERNMENT PERFORMANCE
Faulty Websites Confront Needy in Search of Aid
NEWS FROM CONSUMER ELECTRONICS SHOW
Google aims to put Android in cars [links to web]
AT&T wants to delve deeper into the connected car with Drive Studio [links to web]
COMPANY NEWS
Billionaire Malone Returns to Empire Building Amid Cord Cutting [links to web]
A Conversation With Ralph de la Vega, Chief Executive of AT&T Mobility [links to web]
LOBBYING
Snapchat hires lobbyists for the first time [links to web]
POLICYMAKERS
Chairman Upton Releases Report Chronicling House Commerce Accomplishments in 2013 - press release [links to web]
Former FCC Chairman Genachowski heads to Carlyle Group [links to web]
Evgeny vs. the internet [links to web]
INTERNET/TELECOM
MOBILE INTERNET AND CHEAP HANDSETS
[SOURCE: Quartz, AUTHOR: Christopher Mims]
In 2013 smartphones outsold feature phones, and the dean of Silicon Valley tech investing, Marc Andreessen, says that within three years you simply won’t be able to buy a non-smartphone. We won’t exceed 3.5 billion smartphone subscriptions until 2016. The total number of mobile subscriptions, however, will exceed 7 billion by 2014, according to the International Telecommunications Union. Meanwhile, the total number of mobile phone numbers will also be growing, and will exceed the number of people on earth thanks to countries like India, where many people have more than one phone to take advantage of price variations in different places. Of course, a smartphone isn’t nearly as useful if you don’t have a data connection good enough for browsing the web, downloading apps, streaming music and video, and using maps. Only 30% of the world’s 7 billion mobile subscriptions included mobile broadband in 2013, says the ITU. But according to some estimates, most mobile subscribers will likely be internet-connected within the next decade. In 2014, the smartphone and tablet industry will take big strides in that direction: Usable smartphones manufactured in the motherland of cheap electronics, Shenzhen, will be had for $20, at least in China. With phones and tablets that cheap, the bottleneck for most people won’t be their device, but the cost and quality of mobile access.
benton.org/node/171629 | Quartz
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HOW BROADBAND BOOSTS HOUSEHOLD INCOME
[SOURCE: Broadband Communities, AUTHOR: ]
Both broadband access and broadband speed positively affect household incomes, according to a new analysis by network equipment vendor Ericsson. The study, conducted with Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg, Sweden, and consultant Arthur D. Little, continues earlier work by these three partners on the impact of broadband. The earlier research concerned broadband’s effects on the gross domestic product of entire countries; the new study, “Socioeconomic Effects of Broadband Speed: a Microeconomic Investigation,” examines the effects on individual households. Interestingly, household benefits don’t increase smoothly along with broadband speed. Instead, they rise in steps, and a minimum speed level is required to make any difference at all. This minimum level is itself likely to rise over time, the researchers found.
In Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries -- the most developed economies -- the threshold level for broadband to have an impact is 2 Mbps; gaining 4 Mbps of broadband increases household income by $2,100 per year.
In the less developed economies of Brazil, India and China, the threshold level is 0.5 Mbps, which increases household income by $800 per year.
benton.org/node/171660 | Broadband Communities
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PRINCIPLES FOR A SUCCESSFUL IP TRANSITION: ACCESSIBILITY
[SOURCE: Benton Foundation, AUTHOR: Kevin Taglang, Ted Gotsch]
Last month, the Benton Foundation released The New Network Compact: Making the IP Transition Work for Vulnerable Communities. The report, written by Ted Gotsch, includes 10 interrelated principles to help policymakers guide the transition from traditional telephone service to emerging broadband networks. In our first post, we looked at the availability of affordable broadband networks throughout the country. Today we look at Accessibility. Having telecommunications services reach all Americans is part of the solution. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) also has to ensure that any transition to broadband networks grants all people the ability to use those services as they want. In an increasingly technology-dependent world, there are more and greater benefits available to many communities than ever before. There are legitimate worries when it comes to health monitoring. These services are often dependent on the PSTN, and as residents of Fire Island temporarily found out, the infirm can be left without a way to be observed remotely if the wireline network is replaced with only a wireless one.
http://benton.org/node/171160/
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UNFAIR PHONE CHARGES FOR INMATES
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Editorial staff]
[Commentary] The Federal Communications Commission ended a grave injustice when it prohibited price-gouging by the private companies that provide interstate telephone service for prison and jail inmates. Thanks to the FCC order, which takes effect next month, poor families no longer have to choose between paying for basic essentials and speaking to a relative behind bars. The commission now needs to be on the lookout for -- and crack down on, if necessary -- similar abuses involving newer communication technologies like person-to-person video chat, e-mail and voice mail. Absent regulation, prisons and phone companies will simply use the video chats to get around the price caps on interstate calls. Whatever the technology, gouging prison inmates and their families is both unfair and counterproductive, weakening family ties that could be critical to an inmate’s adjustment to the world beyond bars.
benton.org/node/171683 | New York Times
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SLOW BROADBAND VEXES SCHOOLS
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Stephanie Banchero]
As public schools nationwide embrace instruction via iPads, laptops and other technologies, many are realizing they lack the necessary broadband speed to perform even simple functions. This is crimping classroom instruction as more teachers pull lesson plans off the Internet and use bandwidth-hungry programming such as video streaming and Skype. An estimated 72% of public schools have connections that are too slow to take full advantage of digital learning, according to EducationSuperHighway, a nonprofit that tests school broadband speeds and works to upgrade Internet access. The average school has about the same speed as the average American home, while serving 200 times as many users, according to the Obama Administration. Expanding high-speed Internet in schools involves upgrading wiring, expanding Wi-Fi capabilities or simply spending more money to purchase faster service. Adding to the worries: 45 states and the District of Columbia adopted the new Common Core math and reading standards and most will take the new online assessments in the 2014-15 school year. The test results will be used to evaluate teachers, make student promotion and graduation decisions and rate schools.
benton.org/node/171687 | Wall Street Journal
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LESSONS FROM SEATTLE
[SOURCE: Community Broadband Networks, AUTHOR: Christopher Mitchell]
[Commentary] We recently learned that the Gigabit Squared project in Seattle is in jeopardy. Gigabit Squared has had difficulty raising all the necessary capital for its project, building Fiber-to-the-Home to several neighborhoods in part by using city-owned fiber to reduce the cost of building its trunk lines. There are a number of important lessons, none of them new, that we should take away from this disappointing news. (This is the first of a series of posts on the subject.)
The first lesson to draw from this is what we say repeatedly: the broadband market is seriously broken and there is no panacea to fix it. The big cable firms, while beating up on DSL, refuse to compete with each other. They are protected by a moat made up of advantages over potential competitors that includes vast economies of scale allowing them to pay less for advertising, content, and equipment; large existing networks already amortized; vast capacity for predatory pricing by cross-subsidizing from non-competitive areas; and much more.
[Mitchell is the Director of the Telecommunications as Commons Initiative with the New Rules Project of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance.]
benton.org/node/171633 | Community Broadband Networks
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COLORADO BROADBAND
[SOURCE: Denver Post, AUTHOR: Andy Vuong]
Colorado lawmakers and industry officials are dialed in on plans to overhaul a program that reimburses telephone carriers more than $50 million annually for providing landline phone service in rural areas. A revamp of the so-called High Cost Support Mechanism is expected to rank among the top business issues this coming session after efforts over the past three years failed. The federal government and other states have already restructured similarly outdated subsidies, shifting the money toward broadband expansion. Though competing measures are floating around, the consensus is that Colorado will also aim to repurpose the funds for broadband rather than eliminate the subsidy, which is backed by a 2.6 percent surcharge on land-line and mobile phone bills. The Colorado Public Utilities Commission has initiated a review to determine which areas of the state have sufficient competition and should no longer qualify for High Cost support. Industry leaders expect that process to free up several million dollars as early as this year.
benton.org/node/171659 | Denver Post
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SPECTRUM/WIRELESS
T-MOBILE/VERIZON SPECTRUM SWAP
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Cornelius Rahn, Scott Morit]
T-Mobile US) agreed to buy airwaves from Verizon Wireless for about $2.4 billion in cash as part of a spectrum swap that will give both companies more network capacity in areas where they need it. T-Mobile will purchase 700-megahertz A-block spectrum licenses from Verizon. As part of the exchange, Verizon will get so-called AWS and PCS licenses, which have a combined value of about $950 million. The deal will provide T-Mobile with a big swath of low-band frequencies -- a type of spectrum that Chief Operating Officer Jim Alling has said are the missing piece of its network coverage. Verizon, meanwhile, can use T-Mobile’s so-called AWS airwaves to relieve congestion in cities where network performance has suffered due to heavy traffic. “This deal proves to be a big win for Verizon, which was able to unload spectrum it bought in 2008 for a big premium,” said Walt Piecyk, an analyst at BTIG LLC. He said Verizon is making a 38 percent profit on the airwaves it acquired in a government auction. Verizon never put the spectrum to use because it built out its network with different frequencies.
benton.org/node/171601 | Bloomberg | Washington Post
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WHY T-MOBILE WANTS VERIZON’S SPECTRUM
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Kevin Fitchard]
[Commentary] Why does T-Mobile want to build an LTE network using frequencies Verizon hasn’t touched in six years? There are several reasons, but the main one has to do with the different stages the two carriers are at in their LTE rollouts. Verizon sold the low-frequency licenses because it no longer needed them. Verizon had already built out its coverage network to most of the U.S. population. It no longer needed range, it needed capacity, and those high-frequency AWS airwaves were the perfect vehicle for the high-bandwidth network it craved. Verizon traded in its beachfront property for what it considered penthouse real estate. T-Mobile is in the opposite position. It’s in the process of building a very high-capacity LTE network in the big cities using AWS frequencies (networks just as powerful as Verizon’s). But the big knock on T-Mobile has always been that its impressive 3G and 4G speeds disappear once you leave the city limits. These low-frequency airwaves will let T-Mobile build wide-sweeping networks to fill in those gaps. The reason T-Mobile is acting now to buy those airwaves — apart from having recently raised funds for such acquisitions — is that the 700 MHz airwaves it’s buying recently became much more useful. T-Mobile is getting a portion of the band known as the A-block, which no other nationwide operator is using for LTE. Still T-Mobile remains in the market for more spectrum. The Verizon purchase only gives it 700 MHz licenses covering half the country’s population. If T-Mobile truly wants to shed its reputation as being a city-only service provider, it will have to buy a lot more airwaves.
benton.org/node/171627 | GigaOm
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WIRELESS COMPETITION
[SOURCE: American Enterprise Institute, AUTHOR: Jeffrey Eisenach]
[Commentary] There is more to mobile wireless competition than meets the eye. It’s not about the static efficiency gains associated with economizing on infrastructure costs in sparsely populated areas, but rather about the innovations -- the new and better products and services of all sorts -- that come from dynamic competition between large, complex and constantly evolving platforms and encompasses platform innovations of all sorts, such as AT&T’s successful gamble on the iPhone and T-Mobile’s recent innovations in pricing plans. Dynamic competition is one phenomenon regulators will never be able to mimic or manufacture, but we can hope that, over time, they will learn how to avoid mucking up the works.
benton.org/node/171599 | American Enterprise Institute
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SPECTRUM PLANNING MEETING
[SOURCE: National Telecommunications and Information Administration, AUTHOR: Press release]
Joint statement from Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler and Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information and NTIA Administrator Lawrence E. Strickling on the NTIA and FCC’s Biannual Spectrum Planning meeting on Friday, January 3rd to discuss their agencies’ complementary roles with respect to commercial and Federal use of spectrum, including efforts to make available 500 MHz of spectrum for wireless broadband:
“NTIA and the FCC are committed to working together to make more spectrum available to meet the nation’s growing demand for wireless broadband technologies and services. We discussed and agreed to a number of actions to maintain and improve our collaboration over the coming year with respect to the continuing proceedings on the AWS-3, 3.5 GHz and 5 GHz bands.”
benton.org/node/171644 | National Telecommunications and Information Administration
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VERIZON’S TEXT-TO-911
[SOURCE: Fierce, AUTHOR: Mike Dano]
Verizon Wireless, Sprint, AT&T Mobility and T-Mobile US said they all continue to make progress in deploying services that will allow wireless customers to send text messages to 911 operators in place of voice calls. Of those three carriers, Verizon appears to be the furthest along in its efforts to launch the service by a May 15, 2014, deadline. Specifically, Verizon in a report to the Federal Communications Commission said it plans to offer 911 call centers the choice of three text-to-911 options, two of which are already available and the third targeted for launch in the first quarter of 2014. Verizon said it is working with its Text Control Center vendor, Telecommunication Systems, to offer the three text-to-911 options: SMS using a Web browser client and SMS to TTY, both of which are currently available, and SMS over Direct IP. Verizon said the launch of the SMS over Direct IP capability was delayed from late 2013 to the first quarter of 2014. Verizon said that so far 46 different jurisdictions are using one of its text-to-911 options, up from 37 in October 2013, and several additional deployments are currently scheduled through early 2014. That Verizon appears further along in the process than other carriers doesn't come as a surprise. Verizon had pushed for a nationwide text-to-911 capability long before the FCC announced the May 15, 2014, deadline for the service. Indeed, Verizon first launched a commercial text-to-911 service in September 2012.
benton.org/node/171593 | Fierce
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DIVERSITY
APPLE DIVERSITY
[SOURCE: Bloomberg, AUTHOR: Adam Satariano]
Apple, facing behind-the-scenes pressure from some shareholders to add more female directors and executives, has taken a step to address the criticism and diversify its board. The world’s most valuable company recently added language to a board committee charter vowing to diversify its board. The move follows objections from shareholders Trillium Asset Management LLC and the Sustainability Group, who said they’re disappointed that the iPhone maker has only one woman on its eight-member board, and one incoming female member of the executive team that reports to Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook. The shareholders met with Apple representatives several times in the past few months and said they would bring the issue to a vote at a Feb. 28 shareholder meeting. They said they backed off after Apple added language to the charter that promises to consider women and minorities as board candidates, without making any specific commitments. The new language shows how scrutiny of Apple’s diversity practices has now ramped up after other Silicon Valley companies faced questions over their male-dominated leadership ranks.
benton.org/node/171647 | Bloomberg | ars technica
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AFRICIAN AMERICANS AND TECHNOLOGY USE
[SOURCE: Pew Internet and American Life Project, AUTHOR: Aaron Smith]
This report on African Americans and technology is the first in a series of demographic snapshots of technology use and adoption among different groups of adults in the United States. Based on a survey of 6,010 American adults, including 664 who identify as African American, it offers a detailed look at a number of key subgroups within the black population such as: men vs. women, old vs. young, low income vs. high income, and parents vs. non-parents. Among the findings:
African Americans trail whites by seven percentage points when it comes to overall internet use (87% of whites and 80% of blacks are internet users). At the same time, blacks and whites are on more equal footing when it comes to other types of access, especially on mobile platforms.
Overall, 73% of African American internet users -- and 96% of those ages 18-29 -- use a social networking site of some kind. African Americans have exhibited relatively high levels of Twitter use since we began tracking the service as a stand-alone platform.
92% of African Americans own a cell phone, and 56% own a smartphone.
benton.org/node/171657 | Pew Internet and American Life Project
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CONTENT
AT&T’S SPONSORED MOBILE DATA
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Brian Chen]
Say you want to watch a movie trailer on your smartphone. Why should you pay for the data required to display it when you are essentially viewing an advertisement? That’s the idea behind a program that AT&T calls Sponsored Data. Businesses working with AT&T can pay for the data that is used to consume their content or services so that it does not show up on a customer’s phone bill. AT&T announced three initial partners working with its Sponsored Data program, including Aquto, an ad platform that provides marketers tools to use sponsored data; Kony Solutions, a company that helps businesses develop apps; and UnitedHealth Group, the health care company, which plans to use the program to stream educational videos to people’s mobile devices. AT&T said that when sponsored content shows up on customers’ phones, a Sponsored Data icon will be displayed to show that the content costs them nothing to watch.
Free Press Policy Director Matt Wood responded to AT&T’s announcement: “Caps are supposed to help wireless carriers manage congestion. But if getting a big check from another company suddenly makes AT&T’s congestion concerns go away, that shows data caps aren't necessary in the first place. Caps are merely another way to pad AT&T’s profits. While sponsored data will be pitched as a way to save customers money, it's really just double charging. The customer is still paying for the connection, and won't get a refund just because Facebook or YouTube or ESPN are also paying for some data usage now. Both the customer and the content or app provider are paying for the same data. Only AT&T makes out better. The extra costs could flow back to consumers too, in the form of higher cable bills, or higher prices to use the websites and apps taking on this expense. For example, if ESPN has to pay more money to AT&T just to reach wireless customers, ESPN is going to try to make that money back somewhere else. Content and app providers that can't pay this new toll to reach customers will be at a huge disadvantage, and may never get off the ground in the first place if they can't afford AT&T's sponsor fees. Letting the carriers charge more or less money to reach certain sites is discriminatory, and it's not how the Internet is supposed to work."
benton.org/node/171603 | New York Times | Free Press
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SPONSORED DATA AND NETWORK NEUTRALITY
[SOURCE: GigaOm, AUTHOR: Stacey Higginbotham]
[Commentary] AT&T’s sponsored data announcement will generate outrage in many circles as net neutrality fans and those worried about the next generation of startups cry foul over AT&T’s plans to let companies pay to let certain content bypass AT&T’s data caps. But depending on what AT&T charges and how competitive you think the wireless market is, I can’t work myself into a froth just yet. Instead, based on the implementation, I see an evolution of the internet on the mobile side that makes sense given the limitations of spectrum and the demand for mobile content. As people gave up their unlimited data plans a few years back (because carriers would have made their lives miserable otherwise), the wireless operators now have the perfect stick to beat both the end consumer and the content companies into participating in a double-sided market. One where the consumer and the content provider both pay AT&T. While there are plenty of valid arguments about whether data caps are the right way to solve for worries about network congestion, in the mobile world they have become the de facto standard at the big operators. And even plans that offer unlimited data reserve the right to slow your speeds or throttle your usage in times of congestion. So if you accept data caps as a reasonable way for wireless carriers to manage their networks, then letting companies pay to let certain content or apps bypass those caps seems like a valid innovation in the carrier business model as opposed to a subtle violation of network neutrality.
benton.org/node/171625 | GigaOm
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BAD FOR THE INTERNET, THE ECONOMY AND YOU
[SOURCE: The Verge, AUTHOR: Nilay Patel]
[Commentary] AT&T’s Sponsored Data program is a way for AT&T to levy taxes on companies who can afford to pay. That has huge implications for the free market of the internet: if YouTube doesn't hit your data cap but Vimeo does, most people are going to watch YouTube. If Facebook feels threatened by Snapchat and launches Poke with free data, maybe it doesn't get completely ignored and fail. If Apple Maps launched with free data for navigation, maybe we'd all be driving off bridges instead of downloading Google Maps for iOS. That's not fair competition; that's just pay-to-play. Pull the thread out even farther and it gets even more evil: if sponsored data becomes a de facto cost of business in the exploding mobile market, those costs will just get passed right back to consumers. And rest assured that AT&T will find a way to keep your service rates high and your contract terms restrictive; nothing about this plan involves shifting AT&T's profits, just increasing them. Lower-income customers on cheaper plans will be disproportionately affected: you and I might still pay for data and use whatever services we want, but anyone counting bits will be buffeted into a world of corporate control. If AT&T can levy taxes on access to a hundred million subscribers who are increasingly turning to mobile devices over traditional PCs, that turns the wireless behemoth into major economic gatekeeper on the internet -- a situation that would flagrantly violate the network neutrality principles that govern landline internet but were waived for mobile. That was a huge policy mistake, and now we're paying the price.
benton.org/node/171623 | Verge, The | Washington Post | B&C
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MOBILE APPS A CHALLENGE FOR TV
[SOURCE: Reuters, AUTHOR: Liana Baker]
US cable and satellite television operators, already locking horns with programmers over subscriber fees, are now squaring off over the mobile apps that viewers are increasingly using to watch TV. Internet-based services such as Netflix have gotten millions of viewers accustomed to catching shows on tablets and phones. And as the incumbents are getting in on the act with apps of their own, that has become a sticking point dragging out major programming negotiations, as in the case of Dish Network Corp and Walt Disney Co, which are trying to reach a new rights agreement. These disputes increase the dangers of further blackouts and may mean delays in the development of apps that combine the content, technology and marketing muscle of both sides of the industry. Missteps by cable and satellite operators also raise the danger that some consumers will rely more on Netflix, and other such services, and cancel their pay-TV subscriptions, causing a major drop in industry revenue. Meanwhile, both sides are scrambling to draw consumers to their apps and get the most appealing and profitable deals in place for the future.
benton.org/node/171649 | Reuters
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WILL DIGITAL NETWORKS RUIN US?
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Joe Nocera]
[Commentary] According to Jaron Lanier, author of “Who Owns the Future?”, it’s only a matter of time before the advantages of Facebook, Google, Twitter, Amazon et al. disintegrate. There are two additional components to Lanier’s thesis. The first is that the digital economy has done as much as any single thing to hollow out the middle class. And, second, the value of these new companies comes from us. It is Lanier’s radical idea that people should get paid whenever their information is used. He envisions a different kind of digital economy, in which creators of content -- whether a blog post or a Facebook photograph -- would receive micropayments whenever that content was used. A digital economy that appears to give things away for free -- in return for being able to invade the privacy of its customers for commercial gain -- isn’t free at all, he argues. Lanier’s ideas raise as many questions as they answer, and he makes no pretense to having it all figured out. Lanier wants to create a dynamic where digital networks expand the pie rather than shrink it, and rebuild the middle class instead of destroying it. “If Google and Facebook were smart,” he said, “they would want to enrich their own customers.” So far, he adds, Silicon Valley has made “the stupid choice” -- to grow their businesses at the expense of their own customers.
benton.org/node/171681 | New York Times
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OWNERSHIP
SALEM COMMUNICATIONS
[SOURCE: Politico, AUTHOR: Hadas Gold]
A player in Christian and talk radio stations is buying up popular conservative websites -- moves that could make Salem Communications the next big thing in right-wing media. The California-based company has recently gobbled up sites that reach millions of readers, like Michelle Malkin’s Twitchy.com, the Eagle Publishing group which is home to RedState.com, HumanEvents.com and the conservative publishing house Regnery. The Salem empire already includes more than 100 Christian and conservative talk-radio stations and several Christian-themed websites, as well as HotAir.com and TownHall.com. Though Salem doesn’t appear to be planning major changes to the sites, media experts say the move represents a bid to consolidate the huge conservative market and power up the company’s effort to reach beyond its core conservative Christian devotees to possibly become more of a powerful political force on the right. The consolidation Salem is undertaking is unlike anything seen on the left, where media efforts are generally much more individualized. With the expansion, Salem is well-positioned to expand its audience -- and its conservative influence -- by tapping a new group of listeners and readers described by one media observer as those who are “the sister or cousin” of the hardcore Tea Party member who’s already tuned in.
benton.org/node/171637 | Politico
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REP WAXMAN AND THE TRIBUNE
[SOURCE: The Wrap, AUTHOR: LA Ross]
Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) has sent a second letter to Tribune Company President and CEO Peter Liguori about its proposed spinoff of the Los Angeles Times and other newspapers it now owns, expressing heightened concerns about the transaction based on paperwork filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. “It appears that you are putting onerous conditions on the Los Angeles Times and other newspapers that could jeopardize their survival as a separate entity, the Tribune Publishing Company,” Rep Waxman wrote. “At a minimum, you appear to be putting the profits of the Tribune Company ahead of the interests of the public in viable local newspapers.” Rep Waxman said the spinoff plans would saddle the newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times, with millions of dollars of debt, forcing publishing side to start not just in the red but needing to borrow money immediately to offset costs. He also took issue with the fact that the LA Times would be forced to pay rent to stay in the iconic building which has been the paper’s home for 60 years. “These actions make it appear as if the Tribune Company is looting the Los Angeles Times and other newspapers before the spinoff,” the congressman wrote.
benton.org/node/171667 | Wrap, The | Politico | FT
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SF TO CHARGE OPERATORS OF TECH COMMUTER BUSES
[SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle, AUTHOR: John Coté]
Employee shuttle buses for Silicon Valley technology and Peninsula biotech firms, which have become a symbol of income disparity in San Francisco, will soon be charged for using public bus stops, San Francisco city officials said. The agreement among the city, shuttle operators and the companies that use them had been in the works for months, but the issue took on added urgency in recent weeks as tenant advocates and other protesters blocked Google buses in San Francisco and Oakland. Fairly or not, the air-conditioned, Wi-Fi-equipped buses and their passengers have become the most tangible symbol in the backlash against the city's tech boom as longtime San Francisco residents and others try to cope with soaring housing prices and commercial rents, which have been blamed for forcing out tenants, artists and nonprofits. But blaming tech workers -- and targeting their method of transport -- is misguided, said San Francisco Supervisor Scott Wiener, whose district includes the Castro and part of the Mission. "We need to stop politicizing people's ability to get to work," Supervisor Wiener said as he stood with Mayor Ed Lee, other city officials and businesses representatives to announce the agreement at Muni headquarters.
benton.org/node/171665 | San Francisco Chronicle | LA Times
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TELEVISION
ONLINE VIDEO AND LEGISLATION
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Gautham Nagesh]
Lawmakers have introduced at least three different bills that would reshape the consumer video market, including online video, similar to efforts used to boost the satellite industry in the 1990s. None of the bills is expected to pass right away, and companies looking to expand in online video remain uncertain how far Congress will open the door for them. But lawmakers are responding to the exploding popularity streaming Internet video services sold by companies such as Netflix Inc. Also driving the debate is the rising cost of cable and satellite television. John Bergmayer, senior staff attorney at the consumer group Public Knowledge, said the average household is paying roughly $90 a month for video alone, including fees and taxes. "Even if online video doesn't have all the content, it's more attractive at that price point," Bergmayer said. Pay-television providers "know they can't keep passing on higher and higher costs, but programmers keep demanding higher costs."
benton.org/node/171669 | Wall Street Journal
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GOVERNMENT & COMMUNICATIONS
NSA THREATENS NATIONAL SECURITY
[SOURCE: The Atlantic, AUTHOR: Bruce Schneier]
Through many disclosures, we've learned an enormous amount about the National Security Agency’s surveillance capabilities, how the agency is failing to protect us, and what we need to do to regain security in the Information Age. First and foremost, the surveillance state is robust. It is robust politically, legally, and technically. Second, the NSA continues to lie about its capabilities. Third, US government surveillance is not just about the NSA. The Snowden documents have given us extraordinary details about the NSA's activities, but we now know that the CIA, NRO, FBI, DEA, and local police all engage in ubiquitous surveillance using the same sorts of eavesdropping tools, and that they regularly share information with each other. We have no evidence that any of this surveillance makes us safer. Not only is ubiquitous surveillance ineffective, it is extraordinarily costly. Finally, these systems are susceptible to abuse. The President's Review Group recommendations are largely positive, but they don't go nearly far enough. We need to recognize that security is more important than surveillance, and work towards that goal.
benton.org/node/171635 | Atlantic, The
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FISA AND SEN PAUL FACE OFF OVER DOMESTIC SPYING
[SOURCE: nextgov, AUTHOR: Aliya Sternstein]
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has greenlighted the government's continued collection of call logs from millions of Americans, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper disclosed, as demands for the program’s abolishment reached new heights. Sen Rand Paul (R-KY), a potential 2016 presidential contender, responded saying he will file a class action lawsuit against the government to stop the surveillance. DNI officials had attempted to preempt such blowback when they announced the court's blessing. They made promises to declassify the court order and consider a recommendation to shift data collection to private companies. "In light of the significant and continuing public interest in the telephony metadata collection program, DNI Clapper has decided to declassify and disclose publicly that the government filed an application with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court seeking renewal of the authority to collect telephony metadata in bulk, and that the court renewed that authority on Jan. 3," DNI Public Affairs Director Shawn Turner said.
benton.org/node/171594 | nextgov
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SURVEILLANCE REFORM
[SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, AUTHOR: Christi Parsons]
President Obama is preparing a package of intelligence reforms that will probably put a public advocate for the first time in the secret court that approves surveillance practices and remove a controversial telephone records database from direct government control, aides said. With plans to unveil the changes days before the State of the Union address on Jan. 28, key presidential advisors are looking skeptically at a separate proposal to require a federal judge to approve each use of a "national security letter" except in emergencies, however.
benton.org/node/171680 | Los Angeles Times
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THE MIDDLE GROUND
[SOURCE: The Guardian, AUTHOR: Matt Blaze]
[Commentary] Two of the most egregious National Security Agency revelations might actually hold out a glimmer of hope for privacy going forward. First, we now have evidence, albeit indirect, that the NSA might not have the cryptologic superpowers that some feared they might. In particular, they have had to resort to outright sabotage of a range of security standards and systems that give them trouble. This suggests that a more robust (and un-sabotaged) infrastructure – secured by proper cryptography and without hidden backdoors or so-called "lawful intercept" interfaces – can make mass surveillance genuinely difficult. Which brings us to the second encouraging bit of news, which is that if you are being individually targeted, you really don't stand a chance. How can this be good news? It means that there is no good reason to give in to demands that we weaken cryptography, put backdoors in communications networks, or otherwise make the infrastructure we depend on be more "wiretap friendly". The NSA will still be able to do its job, and the sun need not set on targeted intelligence gathering.
[Blaze directs the Distributed Systems Laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania]
benton.org/node/171678 | Guardian, The
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PRIVACY/SECURITY
SNAPCHAT’S BAD SECURITY
[SOURCE: ars technica, AUTHOR: Casey Johnston]
In their privacy policies and terms of use, the companies that handle our data make plenty of promises about all of the third-party evils they will protect our data from. But those policies contain few limits on what the companies themselves can do with our info or how they will secure it. Case in point: the messaging app Snapchat gives itself access to users' phone numbers and usernames, standard for any messaging service. After ignoring months of warnings from Gibson Security that it was possible to tie together usernames and real phone numbers with incessant queries of the service's Find My Friends feature, the security collective dumped the code to its site. Snapchat took a few days to even acknowledge the problem, and even after hackers created a database with 4.6 million names and phone numbers, the company is still hesitating to apologize or offer its user base reassurance. Security researcher Chris Soghoian said that a lawsuit against the company for this oversight is extremely likely. Snapchat had the information, and hackers had the opportunity. The damage has been done.
benton.org/node/171584 | Ars Technica
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HOW YOUR CELLPHONE PINPOINTS YOUR IDENTITY
[SOURCE: USAToday, AUTHOR: Charles McColgan]
[Commentary] Your mobile phone number is totally unique anywhere in the world. Unlike government IDs, which can be forged and are difficult to verify online, your mobile phone number is unique to you and easy to confirm. When you provide your phone number to an online company, you establish your identity with them. In the future when you forget your password, make account changes, or login from a new device all they have to do is send a code to your phone and ask you to confirm the code. If you have the phone, you are who you say you are. This means that a fraudster trying to get into your account would have to know or guess your user name, your password, AND they would need to steal your phone to get that code. To this end, the first thing websites do is link your phone number with your account. That's why you're asked to provide your number when you register. That's how your mobile identity can tell that you are a legitimate user and not a suspicious one. We all knew our mobile phones were useful, but the power of mobile identity is only beginning to hint at its potential. [McColgan is CTO at mobile identity firm TeleSign]
benton.org/node/171674 | USAToday
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LOCATION PRIVACY
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Julian Hattem, Kate Tummarello]
Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) reiterated calls for a location privacy law, pointing to a recent Government Accountability Office report that found a need for clearer privacy practices for in-car navigation companies. Some companies operating location-based car devices are operating with “unclear” privacy practices that “could make it difficult for consumers to understand the privacy risks that may exist,” according to the report. The GAO surveyed 10 auto manufacturers, device companies and app developers and found that all collected location data to offer consumers’ local services. They sometimes shared the data with other companies, though many had broad or vague disclosure statements. “Without clear disclosures, risks increase that data may be collected or shared for purposes that the consumer is not expecting or might not have agreed to,” the GAO said. Sen Franken, who requested the study, said that the report showed the need for him to reintroduce a bill strengthening privacy measures for location-based services. The Location Privacy Protection Act passed through the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2012 but never received a floor vote.
benton.org/node/171671 | Hill, The | GAO report
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GOVERNMENT PERFORMANCE
FAULTY WEBSITES
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Frances Robles]
Three months after the disastrous rollout of a new $63 million website for unemployment claims, Florida is hiring hundreds of employees to deal with technical problems that left tens of thousands of people without their checks while penalties mount against the vendor who set up the site. Efforts at modernizing the systems for unemployment compensation in California, Massachusetts and Nevada have also largely backfired in recent months, causing enormous cost overruns and delays. While the nation’s attention was focused on the troubled rollout of the federal health care site under the Affordable Care Act, the problems with the unemployment sites have pointed to something much broader: how a lack of funding in many states and a shortage of information technology specialists in public service jobs routinely lead to higher costs, botched systems and infuriating technical problems that fall hardest on the poor, the jobless and the neediest. As a result, the old stereotype of applicants standing in long lines to speak to surly civil servants at government unemployment offices is quickly being replaced. Now those seeking work or government assistance are often spending countless hours in front of buggy websites, then getting a busy signal when they try to get through by phone.
benton.org/node/171685 | New York Times
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